1979 Alien Costume Torso Restoration and Display

Restoration of these rare pieces of a 1979 Alien costume and a new, dramatic display

Costume elements and movie props from the titular character of the 1979 classic sci-fi film Alien are rare indeed. Our client had the better part of a torso of HR Giger’s masterpiece design, but at the time, they were just elements, stored separately. The 1979 Alien costume components were sent to our studio for restoration and a custom display.

The latex Alien costume pieces were in need of a fair amount of repair and restoration. Our goal was to take these elements, restore them and then create a themed display to give them context and maximize the impact of what he had. Some of the repairs were small fixes, filling in cracks in the latex movie prop costume or repairing tears. Others, like the damage to the costume’s lower arms required much more intensive conservation and rebuilding.

When the HR Giger costume’s lower arm pieces arrived they had to be wrapped in plastic to keep them together and prevent any further damage during shipping. There was also a bag of latex chunks that had previously fallen off. We carefully unwrapped the pieces and began the long and tedious process of restoring those arms.

The first step was to repair the larger damaged areas and get the latex arms back to their original shapes. Then the missing pieces were reassembled much like a jigsaw puzzle, with any missing areas being patched to keep the piece looking like it originally did.

Finally, the Alien movie prop parts were professionally mounted on a custom carved torso form (for proper fit and support). That torso was wall mounted to a custom, metal grid themed display we created, which included a photo and plaque. A custom acrylic case was also provided to our client, to further protect this original movie costume. Alone, they were just pieces, but together in a highly detailed and themed display, they are instantly recognizable pieces of horror and sci-fi movie history! Credits: Restoration and Display by Mike Thomas and Tom Spina.